I’ve been hearing buzz the past few days about a huge flaw discovered in the Internet DNS (Domain Name Services) protocol. Apparently this flaw would allow attackers to perform cache poisoning on DNS servers. All world-wide DNS servers contain this flaw. I asked three different technology people today if they had heard about this DNS flaw yet. None of them had heard about it so obviously the message needs to get out.

DNS cache poisoning is serious stuff. If this flaw was widely exploited it would cause untold worldwide financial damage. Imagine being able to route traffic destined for a website to any place you want. You could siphon off user logins to savings and mutual fund accounts. You could disrupt online retail and B2B transactions. You could direct Obama website visitors to the McCain website. You get the picture.

So far security researchers are keeping quite about the exact DNS cache poisoning attack vector. All DNS servers world-wide will need to be patched. Wow.

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